Redistricting Committee Tour Continues

I was in Fort Wayne last night to discuss redistricting with interested citizens. The turnout at IPFW was good and the discussion lively. There was some print & TV media coverage, and I was quoted in the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette:

Commission member Mike Kole, a Libertarian, said that incumbency trumped partisan politics in redistricting. He said Republicans would rather keep safe seats than increase their numbers if it meant incumbents running against one another in reconfigured districts.

“It’s not about party. It’s about self,” Kole said.

The quote came in response to discussion on the conventional wisdom of gerrymandering. After attending several such meetings, I got the impression that people tend to think that gerrymandering happens to protect or unfairly create political power for the party in power. Yes, that's part of it, but I believe it to be secondary.

Probably the most eye-opening revelation I have had thus far was in listening to former Indiana House member Bill Ruppel. Bill is a Republican, but he doesn't mind to tell the story of how the party in majority holds a special meeting of their caucus, whereby the members are given pushpins and directed to a large wall map. They place the pin where they live, and the districts are drawn to protect them as incumbents.

In my opinion, if a fair district map was drawn for the Indiana House, that did not take into account where incumbents live, the Republican Party would likely gain 6-10 seats in 2012. So, why wouldn't the Republicans be all over this? Because, again, in my humble opinion, you would see at least 30 incumbents from both parties gone in 2012, because the fair redistricting would result in some districts with two (or even three!) incumbents in them, and other districts with no incumbents in them at all.

That's why I said that self comes before party. If party was the primary concern, the Indiana GOP would be leading the crusade for fair redrawing of the maps. This explains why, when then-Secretary of State Todd Rokita, a Republican, called for fair redistricting in his 'Rethinking Redistricting' initiative, he was blasted by members of his own party. Sure, they didn't blast him directly on point. They just blasted him. Preservation of personal power is the underlying reason for whatever they actually said.

The Indiana Citizens Redistricting Committee will host two more public meetings:

Tuesday, March 29, in Terre Haute
Thursday, March 31, in Evansville

More info on these meetings via this link.

At last, the Indiana House & Senate is going around the state with meetings at incredible inconvenient dates & times: today and tomorrow. Do they really want public input? Putting meetings on a Friday during business hours? On a Saturday morning or afternoon?

If you go to one of the meetings the House & Senate is hosting, be sure to ask them why incumbent protection ranks higher than incumbent blind drawing of the district maps.

Indiana Citizens Redistricting Commission Formed

I am pleased to announce that I am participating as a member of the Indiana Citizens Redistricting Commission. The gerrymandering of electoral districts and the need to redraw maps with districts without political considerations is an issue I have been pressing for several years, including with my 2006 run for Indiana Secretary of State, and through the present with the lawsuit against the town of Fishers.

The Commission was assembled by Common Cause Indiana, and true to the organization's name, Commission members represent a range of political perspectives. There are Democrats, Republicans, and yes Libertarians represented here. From the Fort Wayne News-Sentinel:

A citizen panel backed by the League of Women Voters and AARP will hold public hearings on the redistricting process and will monitor the drawing of new maps by the Indiana General Assembly.

The Indiana Citizens Redistricting Commission, co-chaired by former lawmakers Dave Crooks of Washington, a Democrat, and Republican Bill Ruppel of North Manchester, says it wants to ensure the redistricting process emphasizes competition and fairness, not incumbent protection and partisan advantage.

Points I made with regard to the numbers of unchallenged races were carried by the Muncie Star Press report:

The citizens commission said a politicized redistricting 10 years ago, when Democrats controlled the House, resulted in the northwest Indiana city of Chesterton, with a population of about 8,000, being divided among three Indiana House districts and the towns of Frankton and Rockport, each with populations of about 2,000, both being divided between two House districts.

It said 17 of 100 Indiana House candidates and five of 25 Indiana Senate candidates faced no opponents in the general election.

Libertarians represented the only challenge to 11 more Indiana House races, and 1 of the Senate campaigns. The Libertarian Party of Indiana has for years recruited candidates specifically in the unopposed races so as to keep issues alive through November in these districts. Without a challenger, the incumbent is done with the May primary, and doesn't have to talk issues at all. The accountability of unopposed candidates is nil.

Link to the Common Cause statement.

We have seen that redistricting can happen without politics, with Marion County being the best example. The county shows a narrow Democratic majority of voters, and since redistricting, the county went from Republican domination on the City-County Council to slim majorities that tip back and forth, which is vastly more representative of the people in the county.

And that's how elections should be. Government should be representative of the people. Sure, politically I might wish it to be a Libertarian government, just as Republicans and Democrats would prefer their party to rule the day. But elections shouldn't be foregone conclusions, thanks to deals between political bosses that protect certain incumbents and certain seats. It's time to draw the map in compact geographical districts and let the chips fall where they may.

Members of the citizen panel agreed to serve at the request of the Indiana chapters of the League of Women Voters, AARP, the political watchdog group Common Cause/Indiana and the Downs Center for Indiana Politics at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne.

Other members of the commission include Barbara Bolling, president of the Indiana conference of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People; AARP Indiana President Clyde Hall; Executive Director Gil Holmes of the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana; Mike Kole, chairman of the Hamilton County Libertarian Party; and Briana Dines of the Indiana University student group Democracy Matters.

I am honored to have been invited to participate in this Commission, and look forward to gathering input from voters from around the state.

Seminar On Gerrymandering Upcoming

The gerrymandering of districts is the act of drawing a map with political boundaries that serve to assure that the party in power stays in power. Libertarians, myself included, have long campaigned against this practice, urging instead for districts that are compact and geographical in nature, thereby allowing voters to more accurately select representatives that reflect the geography.

Common Cause Indiana is hosting a lunch seminar that addresses these issues.

When: Friday, December 17, 2010, 11am - 1pm
Where: Senate Chambers, Indiana State Capitol

Panelists include The Honorable Theodore Boehm, Indiana Supreme Court; Dr. Michael McDonald, Associate Professor of Government and Politics at George Mason University; and Virginia Martinez, Esq., Legislative Staff Attorney for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF).

Register via this link. I'll be there. Look for me!

This is extremely timely, as the Indiana Legislature is charged with redrawing the map this year once the 2010 Census data is released. The release is expected to happen in February 2011, and the Legislature will be looking to act quickly. Proponents of an honest redistricting need to be active right away.